The Midnight Encounter That Changed Jewish History - The Book of Ruth - Rabbi Lazer Brody

[music] >> Get everyone on the same page, we'll make a quick review of chapters 1 and 2 and tonight's chapter 3. Hollywood you could have to try hard but they couldn't make a screenplay of tonight's chapter. But let's have very, very special and very moving and only this is nationally inspiring and inspires each one of us to get close to Hashem and to improve our character and it's also very prophetic about the Messianic times, the coming of Messiah which is soon. You can see everything that's happening in the world, it's coming soon. The world is changing at amazing pace. Okay. So we start with the book of Ruth the chapter 1. Chapter 1 to give a background we give background to the book of Ruth. The book of Ruth took place in the beginning of the period of the judges. The judges were the period after Joshua. Joshua lived till 110 years. Joshua brought the people out of the Jewish people out of the desert across the Jordan into the land of Israel. Joshua led a 7-year war against the Canaanite nations and then he supervised another 7 years where each of the tribes assumed their inheritance. The land of Israel was parceled to each of the 12 tribes. Everyone got and each clan within each tribe got their ancestral inheritance of the land of Israel and they were all settling. But what happened during the 7 years of settling, people were so busy settling. Everyone under his own fig tree and under his own vineyard that they forgot about they forgot about a few things. They forgot about the the communal responsibility of one another that they felt in the desert. Like going through the desert and they were all together but now each one is in his own land. He's not even worried about his first cousin that's got the plot next to his or the the clan within the same tribe. Everyone became very, very egotistical. Okay. So, the busyness of their preoccupation with settling their own land, it led to a lack of compassion, which led to drifting away from Torah because all the Torah is compassion. And just as 50% of the of the mitzvot part of the mitzvot are we have 248 mitzvot for positive mitzvot and 368 mitzvot for negative mitzvot, but a portion of the mitzvot are man against God, man as opposed to God, and many of the mitzvot are man as a fellow man. The mitzvot of man and fellow man, such as charity and loving kindness, this was trampled. They forgot about because it was egotism. So, as a result of egotism and as a result of lack of compassion, it led to the drifting away of Torah. So, now you have a recipe for catastrophe. And what happened is it did, it actually brought catastrophe on the land of Israel and the Jewish people and it brought a famine. There was a famine for many years and we see this all the time. The Jewish people, they can rise up to the stars in the land of Israel or they can go way down the bottom, they can ruinate. And people say, "Why is Hashem so bad that you did?" Land of Israel is the king's palace and you can't act like the king's palace like you do out in the cow Can't Can't act like the It's the king's palace and you have to all the time have impeccable decorum. Okay. So, now we have the setting for the Book of Ruth. We begin with Elimelech. Elimelech was a highbrow. He's from a very pedigreed family in the tribe of Judah. Elimelech was the son of Nachshon. Nachshon, son of Amminadab, was a president of the tribe of Judah. You remember Nachshon attained his notoriety and his fame with his courage. He was the first one to jump at the Red Sea. When other Jewish people, they never learned to to to swim in the desert in Egypt, but now he jumped in the Red Sea trusting Hashem and by virtue of his dedication, the Red Sea split. Well, Nahshon had four sons, one of whom was Elimelech. Okay, so now Elimelech at the beginning of the famine, Elimelech is the aristocracy of the tribe of Judah that lived in the area of what's today in modern Israel, Ephrath, the area of Bethlehem. And he had plenty of money and a big estate. Now, Elimelech was concerned. He says, "Now with the famine with so many beggars, they're going to be knocking on my door day and day and night." He says, "I don't want to give out all my money to beggars." Elimelech didn't realize, as we learned in our lessons of bitachon, our lesson trusting Hashem, that Elimelech got his money in order to be a worthy trustee to Hashem. Okay, so since he didn't want to play that part, what he did, he left Israel and he left Israel the golden carriage and with his two sons, Mahlon and Chilion, and his wife, Naomi, and he went to Jordan, which was then called Moab, that area of called it it was today's Jordan. And what happened in Jordan? Is he lost all his money because he's not doing what Hashem intended money for. He's not using it to serve Hashem. Doesn't need it. Okay, not only did he lose his money, he lost his life. So now that Elimelech is no longer in the scene, Mahlon and Chilion, they do something that they wouldn't do in their father's lifetime. They married out of the religion. They wouldn't do that if the father was still alive. Okay, despite despite the fact that their father was self-centered, he worried about himself, he didn't want to support the but he but he didn't want to support the poor, but he was from a very blue-blooded family. He wouldn't dream of letting his sons marry out. But now that he's no longer in the scene, they marry two daughters of Eglon, the king of Moab. Okay, Chilion marries Orpah. Orpah, well, as we learned is the great-grandmother of Goliath. And Mahlon marries Ruth, who becomes, as we'll see in chapter 4 becomes the great-grandmother of David, great-grandmother of Messiah. Okay. So now something else happens to Naomi. Naomi's already lost her husband and she's lost her money. Now Naomi loses her two sons and she's left with nothing but her two daughters-in-law. So Naomi hears that okay now she's paid she's just divine justice. She said to pay a stiff price. Okay, she's left with nothing. And she hears that there's the first bumper crop after several years of famine and she hears there's food in Israel. Well, she's got nothing left. She doesn't have any shoes on her feet. Naomi that she went with a pearl-studded slippers and a and a carriage a horse-drawn carriage with all this money and all this gold. She went to Moab to Jordan that way. She comes back barefoot with her two daughters-in-law. Okay, they come back and they both stick with her. They say I'm going to cling to you. So they come to the border of Moab and Israel. And Naomi says to them, "Go back to your Go back to the palace. Go back to your your mother and father's home. Find solace in a new husband and because the Gomorrah tells us that a woman only has solace in her husband's home. Find a new husband." She says, "Even if you were to make a leverite marriage to a son, if I were to get married now, you're going to wait 20 years for for me to have a son even if I could have." But Naomi was already old. She said, "I can't have any more children no more children in my womb. So you're not going to wait 20 years anyway. Go back and and be happy." So after a few times of urgings uh Orpah cries and she goes back home. Now the beginning of Orpah's trip back home that night she had a big party with a hundred locals and out of that party was born Goliath. Okay, that's why Goliath is the is the the the the seed of these these hundred rallies. Okay, so then this is a talking juxtaposition of what happened to Orpah what happened to Ruth. Ruth goes and Naomi says, "Well, follow your sister-in-law. Go back to No." Ruth refuses. Three times she refuses. She says, "Your God is my God. Your people are your my people. Where you go I shall go. Where you die I shall die." And from this we learn the halakha that we refuse a convert. Someone comes to convert and say, "What do you want to convert for? What do you need to convert for? They The Jews are the most hated people on Earth and you've got all these 613 mitzvot to do. It's so difficult. You don't need this aggravation." Oh, but they say, "Yes, I insist. I insist. I insist." Three times they insist after pushed away then the fourth time we accept them. We learn this from Naomi cuz Naomi said, "Okay, Ruth, you want to you want to stick with me?" Now Naomi started teaching her the Torah, the laws of Torah, what it means to be a Jew. And this is what they do on the way. So now they cross over the border and they walk all day and all night because they're two women and it's dangerous. I have to say the land of Israel back then it was the wild west. There were robbers and thieves and rape it was not a nice climate in the [snorts] time of the judges because it was pretty reckless and pretty lawless. So they had to walk very fast to get to to Bethlehem and they arrived in Bethlehem the night after the festival of Passover when the barley harvest is about to begin. Okay. So chapter one ends just as Ruth and Naomi are entering Bethlehem. Big drama and people come say, "Is that you, Naomi?" They couldn't believe it. Can you imagine the the Queen of England leaving as the Queen of England and coming back looking something like Mother Teresa or it's or some beggar. They they couldn't believe. This was Naomi. She was barefoot with with bloody feet. She was wearing something that wasn't much nicer than a potato sack and this was Naomi. be. is the end of chapter 1. Now we begin chapter 2. Chapter 2, Ruth begins to show Ruth that she doesn't begin, she continues to show her impeccable character, her wonderful character traits. Ruth refuses Meanwhile, Ruth and and Naomi, they're they're on the they're border starvation. They have There's no record that they had anything on the way back. They didn't have any food, they didn't have anything. They come in and maybe after the the 24 or 48-hour walk from Jordan and crossing over the border and going to Bethlehem, you're talking about a 36-hour walk where they were coming from. And they haven't eaten, they're walking in the hot sun. But they find refuge in the some shack somewhere and Ruth says, she says, "Listen, Naomi told her the laws of the harvest. The farmer has three laws of what he should give to the poor. That if he drops grain during the harvest, he shouldn't stop pick it up, leave it for the poor. If a few shafts are forgotten in the field, he shouldn't go back and pick them up, leave them for the poor. And he has to leave a strip of the field strip of the field for the poor people can come and they can glean from there." Okay. So, she knows that in harvest she's entitled like every other poor person and she says to Naomi, she says, "I'm going to go out in the field and you stay home and rest and with Hashem's help, I'll bring home food." You have to understand, Ruth is the daughter of a king. So, she volunteers, this is not her mother, this is her mother-in-law. And for Naomi, this is not her daughter, this is her daughter-in-law. And it's usually known that if a husband is no longer on the scene and they don't live together, they drift away because a mother and a daughter mother-in-law and a daughter-in-law, they'll get together for the sake of their sons, there should be peace. But the fact when they are themselves by themselves, they should get together, they get along better than mother and daughter. The way Ruth respected Naomi. Ruth is willing to go out in the hot sun barefoot, work in a field, bloody hand, do everything all day long so that two reasons, her mother-in-law should have something to eat and that her mother-in-law should not be embarrassed to go from this rich society woman to be a poor beggar in the field. Ruth says, "I will take the disparagement. I will take the embarrassment. You stay home." So, Ruth goes out in the field and she begins gleaning. Now, the field sets the stage for her future meetings with Boaz. Boaz, we'll soon find out who Boaz is. Boaz was the head of state. Boaz was the nephew of Elimelech, Naomi's husband. Uh Nahshon had four sons. One was Elimelech, one was Boaz's father, one was Naomi's father. Elimelech was married to his nephew. Elimelech was was He was the brother of Naomi's father. Okay, and the fourth, well, he'll he'll be introduced in chapter four. He's Ploni Almoni. Almoni in Hebrew means anonymous. But, since he wasn't so upright, that we we don't embarrass him. We keep his name as anonymous. We don't let him know. And since then, Ploni Almoni's name became the the metaphor for anonymous. So, we see Ruth behaving in the field. She does herself exceedingly exceedingly outstanding traits that you don't see in a young woman. First of all, we see that even though she's royalty, she works from day to night. She is so modest. She gleans way behind the harvesters. They shouldn't look at her. Okay, the workers. And she acknowledges every bit of the kind Boaz comes out to the field. And this is also divine providence. The day before Boaz comes to the field, Boaz was in the religious court in Beth in in Beth Bethlehem. He was the head of the in the area of tribal of tribe of Judah. The head of the religious court in tribe of Judah. He was the judge. And now he comes so Why did he come home the day before? Because his wife died. The day Ruth and Naomi arrive in Israel, Boaz's wife dies. So, this sets the stage. It's amazing divine providence. Hashem is writing the script. Hashem is doing everything in precision divine providence, setting the stage for what's about to happen in chapter 3. So, Boaz he sees this young woman who's so modest. She doesn't bend over. She either she says that she's she can pick standing up, she picks standing up. And if there's grain that's fallen to the ground, she kneels down and sits down and picks up the grain with her skirt completely covering her legs. No one can see anything. She's got her like a potato sack, but it's to her wrist. She She's completely covered. She's got everything and she's got her whole body's covered. She hasn't revealed anything. Her behavior impeccable. Her modesty impeccable. Okay. So, Boaz says, "Who is that?" And they say, "That is the Moabitess that came from Moab, Ruth's daughter-in-law." And they say "Do you see that?" Then Boaz realizes with a divine inspiration that the law that a Moabite cannot come into the people of Israel for posterity is because they were ingrates that this is about a male Moabite and not about a female Moabitess. And Samuel the prophet wrote the book of Ruth just to clarify this law in future generations because he knew in his holy spirit that there would be people that would be protest King David's monarchy. Doeg, the wicked Doeg, he was a He was a tremendous Torah scholar, but he was a wicked person and he had an evil tongue. And Samuel the prophet wrote the book of Ruth to show that a Moabitess, yes, can come in to uh to the Jewish people. Not only did Ruth come into Jewish people, but she brought with her her compassion, her spirit of compassion. She did compassion to her mother-in-law. She did compassion to Boaz. She did compassion to the whole Jewish people. And it's Ruth who turns around the whole national tide of egotism and brings the nation back to compassion. And she sets the stage for Messiah. Okay. So, Boaz notices her good qualities. And we see Boaz lays an eye on her, but we don't know exactly what's going because it it seems ridiculous. Boaz is maybe 80 years old. Even though Ruth is gorgeous, but she's 40. She looks like she's 22. She and she's gorgeous and Ruth doesn't particularly think about about Boaz. Okay. We see in the first two chapters, everything went according to divine initiative. Hashem initiated everything. Now, in the beginning of chapter three, we're not about to start chapter three, which is a really suspenseful and romantic chapter. And that's what we call tonight's lesson, Midnight Encounter. And I'm going to go passage by passage and explain it. There's 18 passages in chapter three. The first passage, Naomi, Ruth's mother-in-law, she says to her, "My daughter, I shall not rest until I seek rest for you, so that life will be good for you." What does it mean rest? Rest means manoach is the word in the megillah in Hebrew. Manoach doesn't mean rest, I'm going to lie down and rest. Rest means a peaceful soul, a restful neshama, a restful soul. A woman has a restful soul only in the home of her husband that loves her, takes care of her. A woman does not have peace of mind, pure peace of mind, and restful soul anywhere else. And that's why the Gemara says, "Heaven forbid when a woman loses her husband, she loses her peace of mind." So, maybe the whole world, okay that we were sorry you lost your husband but she really she suffered it's half of her soul like the Zohar tells us that a husband and wife are two halves of the soul. The same thing for a husband when he loses his wife it tears half of his half of his soul away. That's of course if they have shalom bayit. So Naomi now is becoming proactive. Naomi looks back and she sees what happened. What's going on in the playing field and what Hashem has done. Naomi has unbelievable powers of observation. Naomi's real name was not Naomi. She got the name Naomi as Na'ama it means pleasant. Everything with her pleasantries pleasant. Naomi was a big tzadekes and despite that Elimelech was the way she was he was people called Naomi Naomi because she was so good to the poor. She was so kind to people who needed help. She helped everybody. But then she had to leave with her husband. She couldn't leave her husband. She couldn't say no I've got to stay here and help the poor people. He says we're going and she was a a good wife. She followed the footsteps of her husband. Okay, but now she is looking two and two and she's putting it together four. She gets a message. So what does Naomi see? Naomi sees five main points. Little powers of observing. If we we look and we we take apart it's really have to take a close look at chapter three to understand what Naomi is seeing that nobody else sees. This is spiritual vision. This is spiritual awareness what we call das. This very important with emunah you get spiritual awareness. The more we strengthen our emunah the more we have spiritual awareness. Naomi had fantastic emunah. She was on a very high level of emunah so her spiritual awareness was very high. First of all Naomi looks she looks at Boaz's personality. Boaz's aristocracy. And Boaz unlike other people in the family Boaz has the characteristics of his grandfather Nachshon. He has the characteristics of the true president of the tribe during the time of Moses and Joshua. That was Nachshon. And this goes back to Nachshon's father Aminadav and all the way back up to Judah. And she sees she's got these characters that she sees her daughter-in-law's characteristics. Okay. So, she says, "Wow, if I bring these two amazing people together, there's no limit what their offspring will be able to do." So, now she feels within herself, and this is actually a message from Hashem, but she feels it within herself, that she has to bring them together. Number one, okay. Number two, she sees that Ruth would have a truly good life with Boaz. Now, sometimes young young women have a lot of young women, and especially now it's shidduch season, and a lot of young ladies they ask me have difficulty finding their soulmate. Why have difficulty finding their soulmate? You could be looking for the wrong thing. They look for some Tom Cruise or John Travolta in Flashdance. You don't want that guy. [laughter] You don't need a John Travolta in Flashdance. You need a guy with a good heart. Look for the good heart. Look for somebody's going to understand you. Look for somebody's going to love and respect you. You don't look for some flashy guy. Some flashy guy is flashy on the outside, there's usually knock on the door, there's nothing on the inside. Okay, so Naomi saw that with Boaz, and Boaz's impeccable character, Ruth would have a good life, and she wanted a good life for her. And the third thing Naomi Naomi saw that it would be a great comfort for Ruth to stay in the family. Naomi saw that she's got no more children, and daughters-in-law like this don't grow on trees. Treats her like a mother. And if she marries into the family, Boaz is her first cousin, and she she marries into the family, that's that's fantastic that she said that she was just so good to her daughter. That she saw something, it's unbelievable. She saw what happened. Elimelech disregarded the poor people. Disregarded the land of Israel. Disregarded Jewish people. Went for his own monetary interest to out of Israel. Uh a person is not allowed to leave the land of Israel except to take a wife and except to learn Torah and even that's limited. One is not One is in the land of Israel, one is not allowed to leave the land of Israel. Okay? And a person really before he leaves the land of Israel, he has to ask his rabbi or spiritual guide cuz this is a very severe law. On his own, Elimelech left land of Israel. After everything Hashem did to bring the Jewish people out of Egypt land of Israel and for his money, he says, "No, I'm leaving." So, this was a big blemish. So, he lost the money and he lost his two sons. So, now Naomi sees, "Ah, Ruth has come back and she's confirming. If Ruth marries Boaz, this will be a soul correction. Not only a soul correction, it will be an atonement for everything the family did wrong because now in the end everything is good. Everything's right." So, she saw what an important atonement this would be and what important soul correction it would be. The fifth thing Naomi saw was that from Ruth's report that Ruth told her that Boaz would have Boaz said nice things to her. And she saw that Boaz recognized Naomi understood that Boaz recognized Ruth's impeccable character and her wonderful personality. Okay? But she thinks that Boaz might be hesitant in taking a Moabitess even if she is a devout righteous convert. And Ruth might be hesitant in marrying an old man because Ruth is old. She's a gorgeous gorgeous young woman. And so, Naomi feels she's got to be proactive. So, Naomi, very wise, she becomes proactive. Now, Naomi calls Ruth, "My daughter." And what are our our sages liberated in Megillah, they emphasize that Naomi is telling Ruth, "Listen, don't think for a minute that I want to match you up with Boaz so that I'll have a nice bedroom and a nice mansion and I won't have to live in a stable or in a barn anymore. No, this not for my good. This is for your good, my daughter. For your good, my daughter, whatever happens, because he says, 'Echo, my daughter, I would do the same exact thing for my own daughter that came out of my womb.' This is where I act. And we we know that every word that Naomi says is true. So, we have That's the exact thing we have to pay exact attention to everything the Megillah says. Now, we go to the second the second passage. And the Megillah tells us the Book of Ruth tells us, "And now there is Boaz, our kinsman." We're still in Naomi's uh Naomi's still speaking to Ruth. Okay, Naomi's narrative, she says, "There Is there not Boaz, our kinsman?" She's making suggestion for marriage. Wait a second, Boaz is not a stranger. He's our kinsman. He's in our in our clan. "And is it not with his young maiden in the field that you've been?" We have to understand, this is already in chapter 3. We've jumped 3 months at a time. At she At the end of chapter 1, this was the beginning of the barley harvest at the end of Passover. Now, we are in the end of the wheat harvest, okay, which is 3 months is 3 months harvesting in land of Israel, the barley harvest and the wheat harvest. So, now we're at the end of wheat harvest because one thing in chapter 2, Boaz told Ruth, "Do not go to any other field. Don't work in any other field. Everything you need, your needs, your mother-in-law's needs, you'll find all right here in my field uh with with my maidens and you're not a stranger here." Okay. So, now Naomi says to Ruth, and the suspense is beginning. "Behold," says Ruth, "Boaz, is winnowing barley tonight in the threshing floor." When you winnow, for people city don't learn farm, winnow is when you separate the grain from the shaft. Okay. It's like and that's what you do on the threshing floor. So, Boaz is going to go out and he's going to sleep at night by the granary, by the grain barn. And what we learn here in chapter 3, we learn all about the daily life. We take a look at look the daily life in land of Israel back then, ancient Israel. We see Boaz, though he's a big aristocrat and he's a judge and he's a prominent rabbi, Boaz is personally working in the field. Boaz is not afraid to get his hands dirty. Boaz is doing what he sees, he's settling the land of Israel and he's not like the fat European nobleman with their estates and they don't know what's going on right or left and they've got serfs or fiefs throughout working in the field, their slaves, whatever they have. We learn that Boaz is doing two important things. Okay. Number one, Boaz does what the Talmud says a person must do. Boaz is guarding his assets. As we mentioned earlier, there were a lot of thieves in land of Israel time and Boaz is personally supervising the harvest because it's the first harvest after the famine and you've got thieves all over land of Israel more than ready to steal grain. Okay. So, he's not going to leave his granary at night. And this is what the Gamoran tractate Sota 12A says that a person loves his money should guard his money. But when we talk about a tzaddik, a righteous man loving his money, it's not the lust for money. Why does Boaz guard his money and love his money? Because his money is glatt kosher. His money he tithes his money, he uses his money for charity. We see how meticulous Boaz is about letting the poor people on his land, letting them glean, letting them take the the strip of the field, the paya that's left, letting him take the shihcha, the grain that's left in the field. He is every cent he has is glatt kosher, completely kosher according to Torah. So, this is valuable. This is money that shines. His money shines like a diamond. So, he takes care of his money. Also, the second reason that Boaz is personally in the field that Boaz knows that if he's not in the field maybe the foreman's going to want to harvest then and then this and that the poor people might get in his way. I get out of here. Get out of here, you strangers. Get out of here. Don't bother my workers. And they might chase the poor people away. No. Boaz wanted to make sure that everything is done, that the three mitzvahs called leket, leket is gathering the fallen grain, shihcha, that's forgetting the fallen sheaves, and peah, that's the strip of the field where the poor people come on. These are three deoraisa, three Torah mitzvahs, that these are done properly. And we see how the Torah is so social oriented in taking care of the less privileged. Okay. And then the third thing we see about Boaz we see what he eats. The Megillah tells us what he eats out in the field. His His meal out in the field, you think he's a he's an aristocrat, he's eating pheasants under glass, he's drinking French champagne. Oh, no. Boaz sitting dry black bread and water and he puts vinegar on the black bread as we explained last week, vinegar it keeps a person from dehydrating in the hot sun. This is Boaz's entree. This is his food. Okay. So, Naomi, she knows about Boaz's excellence. Not only is he an aristocrat, he's he's excellent in every way. He's a fantastic Jew, he's righteous, he's a he's everything good. So, now listen to what Naomi tells her. Okay, she says, "Listen, my daughter, wash yourself, and anoint yourself, and wear your best dress, and go down tonight to the threshing floor, but don't make yourself known to anyone, and wait until he finishes eating and drinking." Wow. That hair stands up when you read this passage. What first of all, I don't What does Ruth mean? What does Naomi mean she says to Ruth, "Wash yourself." First of all, we know that Naomi has learned everything up to now. She's learned all the law of Torah, everything she needs to know. Wash yourself means several things. It means go immerse yourself in the ritual bath. This is the night that Ruth officially becomes a Jew. She goes to the mikvah. This is the night she goes to the mikvah. And then she has a double purpose for going to the mikvah. Just a woman goes to a mikvah to purify herself before getting married, she's also purifying herself before getting married. Okay, this is going to be a levirate marriage. We'll explain to you what a levirate marriage is. And then the third reason for washing is Naomi says if there's any trace of idolatry left over from Moab, cleanse yourself. So, these are three things that she's she's Number one, she's converting. Number two, she's cleansing herself idolatry. And three, she's preparing herself for marriage. And then anoint yourself. Anoint yourself that that that's with oil. That was her That was her skin cream. And the sweet-smelling oil, persimmon oil, the best of all from the persimmon persimmon flower. Best best of all, she'll be sweet-smelling coming out of the mikvah. And some of our sages say this was natural. Her anointed She she anointed herself not with physical oil, but she anointed herself with the Holy Spirit. And if a person if we have we have we have we have that expression in Hebrew that's called re'ach Gan Eden. It's the aroma of Gan Eden. When a person has a connection to Hashem, he [snorts] smells beautiful. It's It's un- It's unnatural, but it that that is. A person that has a a connection to Hashem, a person truly holy person, person, he [snorts] smells like the Ganeden. He smells like a lotus flower. Okay. So, now it says Naomi says, "Wear your best dress." Naomi, what are you talking about wear your best dress? You and Ruth have nothing more than one potato sack. What What you best dress? We learn something here. Naomi says to Ruth, "When you come out of the mikvah, and make sure that that day you launder your garment, and smooth it out real nice, and iron it, and you come out with holiness, and you come out with a smile on your face, and you come out with a divine spirit on you, this will be less This is a dress for your soul. Levush haneshama. So, we're saying kabbalah is a dress for your soul. Come out gorgeous. When you see a person like that, a person who's pure, a person who's holy, a person who's nice, it's the nicest thing in the world. But, imagine a person a woman that that's got a hairdo and makeup, and and an expensive dress, and she's nasty. That's an L. The makeup doesn't help. The dress doesn't help. You take a simple girl, a perfect, you know, she comes to wearing a calico dress, Little House on the Prairie, but she's got good character. This is This is what Naomi means. Make sure that your dress, your person, your your inside and out, the dress of your soul, that this is impeccable. Okay. In this way, she's irresistible. And she says, "Now, go down to the threshing floor." Why does she say go down to the threshing floor? If the If there would be the threshing floor would be up in the valley up in the in the hills, then the wind would come and throw the grain all over the place. But, that's why they always made the fleshing the threshing floor in the lowest part of the field, the part of the valley, and that way the he can't feel the wind there. So, that's where you go down. And another thing, it's it also served a purpose here that uh if she was in a high place, everybody could see her. Uh she's up there, but as she's in a low place, people couldn't see her. And then she says, "Wait until Boaz finishes eating and drinking." It's end of a hard day. Sometimes in a hard day, a person have not And And this is something for for shalom bayit that that every woman should learn. Sometimes, a woman is so anxious to talk to her husband, and he comes home after a 12-hour day, and he walks in the door, and boom, she slams him with the problems. Wait a second. Beloved sister, let your man warm up. Let him hang up his hat. Let him hang up his coat. Let him say hello. Let him sit down. And with a smile on your face, talk to him. Then he can listen. This is what Naomi is teaching Ruth, a law of shalom bayit, a law of marital bliss. First of all, once you want to talk to him, you want to hit him with something hard, let him eat and drink first, and now he's happy. And we'll see. She was exactly right. Okay. So, now we go on to the fourth passage. In the fourth passage, Naomi continues, and the plot is thickening, and she says, "And it shall be, when at night he lies down, you shall know the place where he lies down, and you shall go in and lie at his feet, and he will tell you what to do." Oh my goodness. Stop and think what's going on here. How the workers around and this around Ruth, Naomi is sending Ruth on a suicide mission. Okay? Ruth, you got to go in, and you got to find out so nobody sees you, but you find out where Boaz is lying. Find out where he he puts his bed, at which end of the threshing floor, at at the at the haystack, which end of the haystack, and go in and lie down at his feet. Wait a second. Look at the danger here. How's Ruth supposed to find out exactly where where it's a is sleeping in the middle of night so nobody sees her. And what happens if Ruth lies down at the wrong sleeping bag at the wrong wrong bed with the wrong guy. What? He's going to look at her her name and reputation are finished. They're going to get start talking to Ruth. She said she's a harlot, she's this, what? Wow, heaven forbid. This is really And wait a second. When she lies down, Boaz is a distinguished man. Boaz is a judge of Israel. And and Boaz is is 80 years old. And and what if some strange young woman lies down and Boaz sees her? Now, this is really bad news. Look, they they have a scandal. What? Somebody Boaz said an enemy is trying to frame him in a scandal. And he COULD YELL, "OUT! GET OUT OF HERE! WHO do you think you are?" And that way, Ruth she she's finished. That's it. She sees she's a hair's breadth of losing her name, losing her reputation, even losing her life. Who knows if somebody could think they're they're attacked at night? And we said that Israel was a wild west. So, a person probably slept at that time with his knife or his sword next to his sleeping bag, next to his bed pack. And somebody could come in, he could feel startled. And and who knows? She could she could be slapped, she could be stabbed, she Anything could happen. Anything could happen. And after all the convincing that Naomi did to get her to agree to marry an old man, Oh my goodness. After she lies down at his feet, what if he refuses? What if he refuses? Shh. She'd be devastated. She'd be devastated. She can't show her face. So, now she can't go back to Moab, she can't stay in Israel. She had her whole life, her whole fate in front of her. And she could say to her mother-in-law, "Mom, that's all well and good, but going on a suicide mission? Well, a shaheed Shaheed in Arabic is a suicide bomber. She says I I I can't I can't commit suicide. you expecting of me? So, that's the social question. Where did Naomi dream this plot up from? Where did she get the nerve? Naomi saw that it worked for Tamar. And Naomi saw that it made it Tamar was even a more difficult circumstance than Ruth. Cuz Tamar, she did dress herself as a harlot. And the chances that Yehuda would go into to to Tamar I I didn't worse than the chances that something would would go right with with Boaz and and with Ruth. But she saw it succeeded because Hashem wanted to see it. And Naomi, in her own holy spirit, she knew that from this union would come Mashiach. And just as the evil side, we mentioned our very first lesson that the evil side is doing everything to prevent the coming of Mashiach. This is a necessary step to come Mashiach. And Hashem has the full Mashiach. So, Hashem did a a crazy thing with bringing Tamar and Judah together. And now it's the same thing to bring Boaz and Ruth together. And that's where she got the idea. She see, therefore, look at Ruth. Look at Ruth. Ruth, if you can imagine, what's the highest medal of honor that an American soldier could get by the president? The Congressional Medal of Honor. Uh in Britain, it it is the Royal Order. Where she get from the king or the queen? The Congressional Medal of Honor. Look what Ruth answers to her mother-in-law. Suicide mission. You're going to engage your reputation. You might lose your life. She says to her mother, "All that you say, I will do." She says, "Just like what the Jewish people said at the foot of Mount Sinai. Na'aseh v'Nishma." And by this, in this one sentence, Ruth atones for the Jewish people their going away from Torah, now she brings everything back to Torah. She brings Torah back to the Jewish people. She brings compassion back to Israel. And who is she? A righteous convert, a Moabitess. She brings all of this. And so therefore, in chapter in passage six, the Megillah tells us, the Book of Ruth tells us she went down to the threshing floor and did everything that her mother-in-law told her to do. This was the greatest expression of emunah in history. Ruth took her brain and her logic and threw it aside, because if she'd gone with logic, she could never had the strength to do this. She said, "What are you talking about, mother-in-law? This is crazy. This is suicide. THIS SOMETHING ABOUT TO HAPPEN. HOW CAN I GO THERE? HOW CAN I FIND where he sleep find out where he's sleeping? How can he he he not be startled and and and and threaten me or yell at me and then everybody knows, the whole camp wakes up. The whole the whole group and I'm embarrassed out of my skull. She believed in her mother-in-law, she believed in Hashem, she knew she she says, "Your God is my God." Ruth is not only talking the talk, she is now walking the walk. She is being tested in her faith in a way her faith in Hashem, her faith in the Torah, her faith in her mother-in-law that converted her. Okay. So, Ruth's absolute observance of her mother-in-law's wishes is an atonement for Israel's lack of observance in the generation. And we learn from this that a tzaddik's good deeds can mitigate the stern judgments of an entire generation. So, in verse seven, it says and Boaz ate and drank and had gladness in his heart, just like Naomi said so. He had ate and he drank after a hard day's work and he's sitting down on the bed and he's and he's gladness in his heart. And he went to lie down at the far end of the stack of sheaves, the big haystack, the sheaves of the of the wheat about to be threshed. And Ruth, she saw where Boaz and she stepped softly, like a commando, and very gently she revealed where he was lying, and she lied down at the foot of his bed. The Megillah says the Hebrew word Vayegel. Vayegel, that Hashem revealed to Ruth, it was revealed to her. It was Vayegel. It was revealed to her where he lied. Doesn't say that she found out, it was her intel mission. Vayegel. Where do we say that word again? Hagar, when she went into the desert with Ishmael, she threw the Ishmael away, she said I'm starving, this and that, and Hashem, it said Hashem opened up her eyes, and she saw the well there. She didn't see the well before that. Hashem opened up her eyes. Hashem opened up Ruth's eyes, so she could see exactly where Boaz was. This was divine providence. This mission could not have been done without emunah, because it was only done Vayegel, it's by virtue of emunah, the fact that Hashem revealed to her because she put her logic aside, Hashem, I cannot possibly do this on my own. You must do this for me. Oh, my beloved daughter, you asked for my help? You've got it. And that's exactly what Hashem did for her. So now we come to the height of the expanse of chapter 3 and almost the whole Megillah. And it came to pass at midnight, says verse 8, that the man was startled. Boaz was startled. Yes, he's shocked. All of a sudden he sees this young woman at the end of his bed. What? And he turned over. What did he see here? He would turn over. A person turns over in bed. He turns over in bed, he sees this young woman at his footsteps. Okay. And behold, a woman is lying at his feet. Wow. So, imagine Boaz startled. He could have yelled. He could have slapped her. He could have thrown something at her. He could have pulled a knife. Up until now, we've been talking about Ruth's modesty and Ruth's good character. But look, she is now in the service of Hashem doing something so uncharacteristic, just like Abraham was a man of compassion. Hashem tells Abraham, "Sacrifice your son that you waited 100 years for." "Okay, Hashem. Put my brain aside." Abraham could have said to Hashem, "What do you mean, Hashem? What do I I talk about you against human sacrifices that the idolaters do? And now everybody's going to say, 'Look, Abraham sacrificed his son. This whole thing of monotheism, it's garbage. He does the same thing that did all the idolaters do.'" He put his brain aside. This is what Hashem told him to do. Ruth does the same thing. Ruth knows that Hashem wants a woman to be modest. Ruth knows that Hashem wants a perfect garment that where a woman wants to preserve her holiness. But she does what she does, the most brazen act a woman could do. What's the most brazen act a woman could do? Throws herself into into some man's bed. This was Boaz's bed at the end of the the day's stack. And she comes at the edge of his bed. And this shows how dedicated she was to Naomi and to Hashem because she did something exactly opposite to her logic, to her nature, to everything. Someone could come there and go, "Hashem, what are you doing? This is against Judaism. It's against holiness. It's against everything." Okay. But now, because of Ruth's act of emunah, because her mother told her her mother was her ribbit, her mother her mother-in-law told her what to do, she throws logic aside and she does it. And we see the whole Ruth's whole life, Boaz's whole life, the future of the Davidic dynasty, and the future of Mashiach are all riding on this one moment, this one act of emunah. So, Boaz says to her, "Who are you?" And she answers, "I am Ruth, your handmaid. And therefore, spread your wings over your handmaid." She's talking about herself. "For you are a near kinsman." What did she mean by spread your wings? Okay. Ruth is saying to Boaz, "Take me in levirate marriage as the Torah commands in Deuteronomy chapter 25." What's a levirate marriage? Levirate marriage, the time of Torah, it strictly requires a living brother or a next of kin to marry the wife of a deceased brother who died with no children. In other words, to build your brother's home, so to speak. That's what the the Torah says. Okay, this is called a levirate marriage because the living next of kin is called the levir, l e v i r, and so the marriage is levirate marriage. And it's not like a marriage ceremony. How do you make a levirate marriage? That he takes the wife and he goes into her, and they consu- consummate the marriage, and then they're they're married. Okay? This is what Naomi told Ruth to do. Now, phew, the romance and the success is far over. But But here in the Torah, the romance is an abstention. We'll see that Boaz waits for the right time. Okay. So, Ruth shows that she's coming to Boaz in the name of Torah in holiness. She's showing that she knows the law of Torah. She knows all about levirate marriage. She knows exactly what the book of Deuteronomy says in chapter 25 in verses 5 to 10. She knows all about it. She's Boaz, Rabbi Boaz, don't think that there's any chutzpah, that there's any brazenness what I'm doing. I'm doing exactly what I must do according to Torah that my deceased husband, Mahlon, who was your first cousin, your second cousin, and and you're the next of kin, uh he died without leaving any children and you must assume his estate and I'm part of his estate. Okay. So, Boaz therefore answers and she's doing this Can I remember another thing? Ruth knows how young and beautiful she is. She has her potential, what the women say today of having a good time, quote to speak. Okay. And Boaz is very old. And the triple dedication of what she's doing. Okay, so Boaz says in verse 10, ah "Blessed are you to Hashem, my daughter." First of all, he still calls her my daughter cuz who says my daughter is holding himself back? He's talking to her like a daughter, not like as a future wife or a fiance, anything like that. He says, "Your latter kindness is even greater than your initial kindness." Her latter kindness in affording herself to leveret marriage, a holy marriage according to Torah, even despite the fact that it means she's going to be marrying an old man, it's even greater than her initial kindness, the kindness she did by clinging to her mother-in-law so the mother-in-law wouldn't be alone. And then Boaz says, "Inasmuch as you haven't followed the young men, whether rich or poor. No, you could have a Tom Cruise and you'd have this movie star and that movie star and and this uh >> [snorts] >> you know, with whatever rich man or this rich man or this jet-setter or that jet No, and you've come to me because you've come to follow holiness. So, this is Boaz. And he sees something else. He sees Ruth. She's speaking very calmly, but she's trembling, sages tell us. And he sees, my goodness, Boaz is such a empathetic and so sympathetic. And Boaz can feel That's why he's a judge. He can feel every person. Boaz can feel. And Boaz has a characteristic that this certainly shows why his offspring should be Mashiach because Mashiach is going to have to feel the pain of every single person. King David was Messiah. King David was the anointed king. And that's why King David wrote Psalms. And that's why we all identify with Psalms so much because King David knew everything we went through. He knew everything. Pick up the book of Psalms, wherever you open up to, and it's talking about yourself. It's talking about your tribulations in life, talking about your difficulties in life. That's King David. Where did King David get it? He got it from his great, great grandfather Boaz. Boaz could feel that. And Boaz looks at her. He says, "I know she's compassionate, and I know she's kind, and I know she's she's modest, and I know she's holy. But she's so brave. Look at her trembling. Look what could have Look what could have happened to her. Someone could have found her or something like that. So now Boaz calms her down. He's not even THINKING ABOUT HIMSELF. LOOK AT SOMEBODY else self-serving. Oh, maybe somebody could have seen me. No, get out of here, girl. Uh uh somebody could have seen me, ruin my reputation, make a scandal. No, he doesn't even think about himself. He thinks about her. And he says, he talks to her kindly. And that's why you you you talk to you talk to someone you love, you talk to kindly. He says, "My daughter, fear not. I will do for you everything that you require. You require a levirate marriage, I'm going to do it. Because my people know that you are a virtuous woman." Boaz is the first one in Torah to use the expression Eshet Chayil. "I know that you're an Eshet Chayil." And we see that Boaz as a judge, he also had a holy spirit, plus he knows that Ruth's great, great, grandson King Solomon in chapter 31 of Proverbs, that's the song Eshet Chayil that we sing on Shabbat. And Boaz calls her an Eshet Chayil. "You will be the great grandmother of the man that writes Eshet Chayil because you are the Eshet Chayil. You are a woman of valor. You are a woman of virtue. You have every virtue. You have modesty. You have holiness. You have fantastic compassion. You have a great personality and you are courageous. Wow. Not only that, she's ingenious. And how did she she find with Hashem's help? She found where he's sleeping. Boaz looks at her and Boaz says, "My goodness. This woman has every single characteristic that Mashiach will need. Every single characteristic." So now Boaz explains in in that verse 12, he says, "It's true that I'm your kinsman, but there is a kinsman closer to me." And that's why Boaz for the moment cannot touch her. Because there's someone closer in line. Boaz was a first cousin of Naomi, but Boaz's uncle was Naomi's uncle. And an uncle is closer to first cousin because an uncle is a father's brother. It was Elimelech's brother. Elimelech's brother. He's first in line to inherit the estate and to inherit Ruth. Okay. But uh what's the word that the Megillah uses for kinsman? He uses the word goel. It's not kinsman. Goel is a redeemer. Boaz says, "Yes, I'm your redeemer, but there's someone closer to me." So closer to me, uh Boaz once again was the son of Salmon, who was one of the four sons of Nahshon, and he was first cousin to Naomi. But this guy, Ploni Almoni, is Elimelech's brother. Not Elimelech's nephew, which Boaz was. So that prevented Boaz from touching Ruth. Because otherwise, if Boaz was number one in line, he could have consummated the marriage right then and there, levirate marriage, and wake up and explain, "Okay, I've inherited Ruth and inherited the estate and we're happily married. Thank you." No. But the Gemara tells us, the Gemara Tractate Sanhedrin tells us that the test of Boaz not to touch this gorgeous woman in the black of night that's right at his bed and he didn't touch her and he observed Hashem's Torah and knew someone before this was greater than the test of Joseph and the wife of Potiphar. Because Joseph, it wasn't at night and it wasn't in bed. Here this woman is in bed with him. He didn't touch her. Did not touch her. And the Gemara lords Boaz says that the Joseph's test was easy compared to Potiphar. We see by virtue of Joseph's holiness the Jewish people left Egypt. We say by virtue of Boaz's holiness we have King David and Messiah fast on the way. So what does Boaz tell her? He tells her in verse 13, "Tarry this night a little bit longer cuz in the morning if Ploni Almoni redeems you, the one that's closer in line, then that's fine. Then we'll let him do his kinsman duty. But if he's not willing to do the duty of a kinsman for you, I will do the duty. Okay? You will not be alone." Boaz is now telling Ruth, "I am more than happy and honored to marry you and lie down until the morning." He wouldn't let her go in the night. It's dangerous to go back at night. Lie down in the morning. But meanwhile both the names and reputations of Ruth and Naomi are still on the line of Ruth and and Boaz are still on the line. Because what if somebody discovers them in the middle of the night? What if somebody walks to Boaz's side of the haystack? What if somebody happens to say, "Hey, hey, Boaz, how are you How are you?" So Boaz didn't go back in bed. He told Ruth to lie down and Boaz went a few steps away and he cried all night long to Hashem. He prayed all night long to Hashem with tears streaming down his face and he said to him, "Hashem, you know that I didn't touch her cuz your will. You know I didn't touch her." And Boaz said the evil inclination was calling on the reserves. Boaz was being bombarded with tanks and artillery and jet plane. He didn't list evil inclination. He did not touch her. He only thought about Hashem. He said, "Hashem, measure for measure. Measure for measure, I didn't touch her. Okay, Hashem, measure for measure, don't let anyone discover her." "I didn't discover her, {quote} {unquote}, don't let anyone from the outside discover that she's here because that would be a tremendous defamation of of your holy name to be a Hashem, and we don't want that to happen." So, therefore, by virtue of Boaz's prayer, what happens in verse 14? And she lay at his feet in the morning, at the feet of his bed, and she rose up before anyone could discern her, she rose up before the first light. And Boaz said to her, "Let it not be known that any woman came to the threshing floor." But once again, rather than worried about himself, Boaz worries about her. So, what does he do? What does he do? He doesn't let her go back into the city alone. Doesn't let her go back to to where where Naomi's Naomi's barn where she's sleeping. He says to me, "Bring me your veil." So, she has her scarf like her veil that you go in the field, she says, "Bring your veil." And he said, "Hold it." So, she held her veil, and while she held her veil, Boaz filled it up with barley. With barley. He says, "Bring this home to your mother-in-law." And he went in the city because Boaz did not want Naomi to think that for a moment he forgot about her. Up till now, Boaz was keeping his distance. He was keeping his distance, but but then when all this according to Hashem's plan, Boaz shows that okay, Naomi, I know I'm your next of kin, first cousin, we'll wait and see what happens. So, Boaz wants to resolve the issue right at the beginning of the morning. He's not going to wait. He's not going to wait. So, what he escorts Ruth first of all so that no one will touch her, and he makes sure she's safely at home with Naomi. Look at this thing. Somebody could have seen them. Somebody could have seen them, but then again, they're finished. What Then all the all the gossip and he didn't care. He put his reputation on the line again. All night long, it's their name and reputation online. They're doing it for each other. Unbelievable giving. All giving. So, when Naomi comes home to her mother-in-law, as we see in the last three passages, I'll read them and explain them. And Naomi came into her mother-in-law and she and the mother-in-law said, it was early in the morning. So, Naomi woke up and says, "Who are you, my daughter?" And she says, "And so Ruth told her everything that happened to her. And we could think that Ruth could be terribly disappointed. And maybe there was an element of disappointment because she went to the mikveh, she dressed up, she anointed herself. But Ruth says, "Boaz gave me these six measures of barley cuz he said, 'Don't go empty-handed to your mother-in-law.'" He's not thinking of himself, he's thinking of Naomi, who's the shatnez. She set this all up. She's the matchmaker. And then Naomi says, "Okay, become, my daughter, sit still because uh Boaz will not rest until this matter turns out, until he finishes this matter today." Like the height of suspense. We'll see what's going to happen. All right? And that's where chapter three ends. >> [laughter] >> This is just like a series, the height of suspense. So, come back next week. Okay, come back next week for chapter four. Bo Hashem. So, we'll see uh Bo Hashem one thing we can reveal, there's a very happy ending. Okay, and we'll all be seeing you see you all back next week. And meanwhile, shavua a wonderful week and a wonderful Shabbat. You're all in my prayers. I take you with in my heart wherever I wherever I go. You should get all your heart's [clears throat] wishes for the very best. >> [music] [music] >> Woo!